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It's all fun and games until social media gets censored

That’s the fun version of social media virality. What we share on Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, WhatsApp, and, yes, Twitter, spawns (for better or worse) unfiltered discussion online and water cooler chat IRL.

This free flow of information is also what makes social media effective for social change. During political strife, protesters worldwide have turned to social media to communicate and organize. Activists aren’t the only ones paying attention, though. Many governments who’d rather people not rise up and make themselves heard the world over have caught on and now continually block or restrict access to social media platforms.

And every time this happens, a virtual private network (VPN) restores people’s free access to the internet, which we believe wholeheartedly is their right.

From Standing Rock in North Dakota to the Arab Spring, protests worldwide have gained attention, size, and support via social media. This year’s Women’s March is a prime example of how social media can spark organization and conversation. With more than 3 million people marching in cities nationwide, it’s been called the biggest protest in US history (and spawned international gatherings, as well). How does a social phenomenon like this reach and resonate with so many people? Facebook. With more than a billion diverse users constantly on their feeds, the social media site clearly affected the event, according to organizers. Jenna Arnold, a Women’s March advisor, told Wired.com, “It would be hard to say that we would have had this kind of success without an existing platform like Facebook.”

Restrictive governments not only don’t want to allow people to get online freely, they want to censor content first, then distribute it after it’s been “approved,” spawning misinformation and propaganda. Freedomhouse.org, an organization dedicated to the open and free internet, estimates that 2.5 billion people live in areas where they consider the internet restricted. The most notorious of these is The Great Firewall of China, where Facebook, Instagram, Youtube, Twitter and even Pinterest are blocked.

What's going on with social media in Kashmir?

From April 26 to May 26, Kashmir put a 1-month block on all social media sites and private messaging apps. This came in response to videos showing alleged abuse by authorities of Kashmiri citizens. The videos quickly went viral on Facebook and YouTube, and youth used popular messaging service WhatsApp to spread the news, discuss it, and communicate with the “outside” world.

What exactly do Kashmir’s powers-that-be have to fear? A lot. Think back to how far-reaching the Women’s March became, due in great part to social media spread of information. Then during the march, participants used social media to give real-time, first-person accounts of its success. Then after the march, news of its historically large crowds spread even more quickly. This rapid, widespread sharing of unfiltered (i.e. “unapproved”) messages is precisely what Indian authorities fear. So they’ve taken away social media. Because in today’s world, blocking social media equals blocking free speech.

How do you jump over government censorship online? With a VPN

Kashmiris (and other people living under oppressive regimes) have found a solution: accessing the internet via a VPN. A VPN lets users privately access whatever information they want to online, by changing the location they connect from to wherever they like. That way even if your government is hell-bent on preventing you from communicating and organizing (to defeat exactly this sort of ban), you can get online as if you’re in the United States, or the UK.

Hide My Ass! is proud to make and support a product that allows everyone access to a free, open internet. Visit our website to learn more and to exercise your right to access and share information, no matter where you are.